To maintain user account security and leave Azure AD Multi-Factor Authentication enforced, app passwords can be used instead of the user's regular username and password.

Some older applications don't understand this break in the sign-in process, so authentication fails. When a user account is enforced for Azure AD Multi-Factor Authentication, the regular sign-in prompt is interrupted by a request for additional verification. This article shows you how to use app passwords for legacy applications that don't support multi-factor authentication prompts.Īpp passwords don't work for accounts that are required to use modern authentication. After Azure AD MFA is enforced, app passwords aren't required for the client.

Office 2013 clients, including Outlook, support modern authentication protocols and can work with two-step verification. Modern authentication is supported for the Microsoft Office 2013 clients and later. These app passwords replaced your traditional password to allow an app to bypass multi-factor authentication and work correctly. To use these applications in a secure way with Azure AD Multi-Factor Authentication enforced for user accounts, you can use app passwords. An Azure AD Multi-Factor Authentication (Azure AD MFA) user who attempts to sign in to one of these older, non-browser apps, can't successfully authenticate. Some older, non-browser apps like Office 2010 or earlier and Apple Mail before iOS 11 don't understand pauses or breaks in the authentication process.

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